Prize Includes All-Expenses-Paid Trip to New York City,
Meetings With Publishing Professionals
Emerald ᏃᏈᏏ GoingSnake (left) and Kira Hayen (right). Credit: Sunny Lu, Shola C. Sogunro. 
New York, NY—July 18, 2024—Poets & Writers today announced the winners of the 2024 Maureen Egen Writers Exchange Award are Emerald ᏃᏈᏏ GoingSnake for poetry and Kira Hayen for fiction.
The Writers Exchange Award provides winners with a unique opportunity for professional advancement. Poets & Writers will invite GoingSnake and Hayen to identify agents, editors, authors, and other literary professionals they wish to meet. Staff will then arrange appointments with as many of these individuals as possible. This fall, the winners will travel to New York City, all expenses paid, where Poets & Writers representatives will accompany them on visits to gain advice, insight, and professional contacts.
Poets and fiction writers who are enrolled members of a Native American tribe in the contiguous United States or Alaska were invited to apply for this year’s award. Novelist Kelli Jo Ford judged for fiction and poet Jake Skeets judged for poetry.
Ford said of Hayen’s winning submission: “This story astounds in form and function, turning traditional Hasinai stories into fully formed contemporary characters, complete with worry, pain, and love. It, too, is a teaching story, asking us to consider what is the privilege of living on a warming planet full of plastics destined to outlast us all. The answer is as moving as it is surprising. I’m desperate to read more from this incredible writer.”
Of GoingSnake’s work, Skeets said: “These poems are an embodiment, each break and beat is something felt—like a dance or two birds swinging in the air. The poems position Native poetry in conversation with the wider U.S. poetry landscape in what feels like perfect timing as we turn to language to help strengthen our communities.”
The judges also cited first runners-up Kimberly Blaeser (fiction) and Mary Christensen (poetry). Excerpts from the winning manuscripts can be found at at.pw.org/wexaward.
The Writers Exchange Award is generously supported by Maureen Mahon Egen, a member of the Poets & Writers Emeritus Board. Past winners have published books, received fellowships, secured teaching positions, and laid the groundwork for their professional writing careers. The award has helped to launch the careers of Sue Monk Kidd (The Invention of Wings, The Secret Life of Bees), David Mura (Turning Japanese: Memoirs of a Sansei), Craig Santos Perez (from unincorporated territory [åmot]), Mona Simpson (Case), Lidia Yuknavitch (Thrust), and others. To date, one hundred fourteen writers from forty-four states and jurisdictions have participated in this enriching, career shaping experience.
Emerald ᏃᏈᏏ GoingSnake is a poet from the Giduwa and Mvskoke nations in Oklahoma. She was a panelist for the 2022 Western Literature Association Conference and is a 2023 Indigenous Nations Poets Fellow. Her work has appeared in Beloved: A ButchFemme Zine and Frozen Sea, with forthcoming publications in Tribal College Journal and on Terrain.org. GoingSnake is currently a senior at the Institute of American Indian Arts in Santa Fe, NM, studying poetry and creative nonfiction. She plans to pursue an MFA in creative writing after graduation.
Kira Hayen is an artist and writer enrolled in the Caddo Nation of Oklahoma and is of various indigenous and settler descent. Her work explores the political and personal intersections of her identity. As a painter, Hayen has exhibited in the Contemporary Caddo Art Exhibition, “Savages and Princesses: The Persistence of Native American Stereotypes,” and the Oklahoma Center for the Humanities exhibition, “Harmony of Duality: A Two-Spirit Journey.” Hayen received an MFA in Creative Writing from the Institute of American Indian Arts and currently resides in Oklahoma City.
As part of the winners’ trip to New York City, Poets & Writers will sponsor a reading and reception for GoingSnake and Hayen. In addition, the winners will be offered a one-month residency at the Jentel Artist Residency Program in Wyoming.
ABOUT POETS & WRITERS
Poets & Writers is the primary source of information, support, and guidance for poets, fiction writers, and creative nonfiction writers in the United States. Our mission is to foster the professional development of poets and writers, to promote communication throughout the literary community, and to help create an environment in which literature can be appreciated by the widest possible public.
We advance this mission through Poets & Writers Magazine, the leading publication of its kind; a website that provides extensive resources for writers as well as a lively online community; professional development opportunities for writers; and grants that pay writers for giving readings and leading writing workshops in small towns and big cities across the country. We sponsor the Jackson Poetry Prize and Maureen Egen Writers Exchange Award. We are guided by our core values of service, inclusivity, integrity, and excellence and are committed to becoming an antiracist organization. Learn more at pw.org.
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CONTACT:
Rachel Schuder
Director, Development & Communications
Poets & Writers, Inc.
(212) 226-3586 x201
rschuder@pw.org